What, to the minority, is democracy?

Photograph courtesy The Independent

QADRI ISMAIL- 11/03/2018

Maithripala Sirisena violates the constitution, stands to destroy democracy itself. Liberals, overwhelmingly Sinhalese, are aggrieved, appalled, aghast.

As a minority, I laugh. Not the happy laughter of someone enjoying a good joke. But the bitter, mirthless cackle of someone forced to read this script many times before – like every full moon, when the temple speakers blare its bana and you can’t blot out the noise with sleep because the liquor stores are closed.

All postcolonial Sri Lankan heads of government, all of them Sinhalese, have consistently violated the constitution and/or “threatened” democracy – usually by practicing it – and/or oppressed minorities. One could deem it a job requirement.

Just a few months after independence, Don Stephen Senanayake denaturalized, then disenfranchised ‘Indian’ Tamil citizens, already alienated from this country by their naming. Constitutional? Probably not. Democratic? Absolutely – passed by a majority of Parliament.

Taking his cue from his father, Dudley Senanayake continued the Gal Oya scheme, to extend Sinhalese colonization of the east. It worked, democratically, to dilute the democratic prospects of Muslim and Tamil voters in electorates from Trincomalee to Amparai.

Solomon West Ridgeway Dias Bandaranaike’s record is too well known to require iteration, but take ‘Sinhala Only’ as example, exemplary. Again, probably not constitutional. Certainly democratic.

His wife, Sirimavo Bandaranaike, massacred thousands of innocents in the name of battling the JVP insurgency. I haven’t read the constitution she operated under lately, but I doubt it authorizes state sanctioned murder. (Ironically enough, she incarcerated Rohana Wijeweera and other JVP leaders in Jaffna – where they radicalized the first generation of Tamil nationalist militants.) Notoriously, of course, Bandaranaike replaced that constitution with another that effectively made Buddhism the state religion. All achieved democratically, with a parliamentary majority.

Junius Richard Jayawardene’s government passed the obnoxious Prevention of Terrorism Act, democratically. It failing to prevent “terrorism,” Jayewardene presided over, and justified, the July 1983 anti-Tamil pogrom in the southern parts of the country. Repression only producing resistance, not submission, Jayawardene then unleashed his military against Tamils in the north and east, slaughtering hundreds. Jayawardene naturalized violence as response to a political problem.

And let’s not forget: enjoying a five/sixth’s majority in Parliament in his first term, wanting to extend its mandate without an election, Jayewardene did so with a simple majority vote at a referendum. While keeping the undated letters of resignation of all his MPs in his pocket. How shrewdly, brilliantly democratic!

Initially, Ranasinghe Premadasa let his military loose down south. Among his victims, my friend Richard de Zoysa. When Prime Minister, Premadasa persuaded Jayawardene, towards the end of his regime, to amend the constitution so as to allow a state of emergency to be declared and ratified with a simple majority in Parliament. (It had previously required two-thirds.) All perfectly democratic.

Chandrika Kumaratunga campaigned for President promising nothing short of justice for the Tamil people. Stymied by Velupillai Prabakaran, rather than persist with negotiations, she launched a “war for peace” against the Tamils. Without irony.

Mahinda Percy Rajapaksa’s military butchered an estimated 40,000 Tamil civilians in the course of defeating the LTTE. Rajapaksa eliminated presidential term limits, thus diluting, democratically, the democratic rights of every citizen. And exterminated Sinhalese dissenters, including my friend Lasantha Wickrematunge.

Rajapaksa turned Sri Lanka, at least that part of the people not with him, into a nation of permanently strained necks. You never went out in public without watching your rear. In order to look forward (to peace) you had to look back. You learned to speak like cinema-goers, in the lowest of whispers, didn’t trust anyone, even the trishaw-driver who drove you for decades. Your cellphone was paralyzed: either recharging or downloading the latest encryption app. Mostly, you were scared shitless. Rajapaksa terrorized Sri Lanka almost as effectively as Prabakaran. And the Sinhalese people loved him, adore him.

Of Ranil Wickremasinghe one need utter just a single word: Batalanda. Though I don’t think the constitution authorizes robbing the Central Bank, either. It’s a testament to his general ineptitude that he got caught. To the Rajapaksas’ savvy, that they didn’t.

Wickremasinghe takes the presidency as his birthright. An elitist – as Education Minister he once wanted to “horsewhip” striking undergrads – whose elitism has only increased over the decades, he expects the Sirisenas of this country to beg for the vote, then step aside and leave him and his cronies the task of administration.

Within the frame of our postcolonial politics, Sirisena’s move, though unconstitutional, isn’t particularly shocking. Not to a minority. To achieve legitimacy as a Sri Lankan head of government you must violate the constitution. It’s a right of passage.

Now this could be a peculiar characteristic of Sinhalese leaders: they establish rules for the sheer pleasure of breaking them, flout constitutions to demonstrate their superiority to the law. They take the police as extensions of their extortion racket. Understand a bribe as an entitlement, their children’s excesses as a job perk, nepotism as the norm.

But, in so doing, they are not particularly different from the current leaders of many states, including Turkey and India.

We apprehend democracy as an unqualified good, the horizon of our political desires, the best possible, conceivable form of government. But what is democracy in the first place?

Perhaps its best known slogan: “government of the people, by the people, for the people” (Abraham Lincoln). Sounds perfect; how could anyone oppose, even question such a system founded upon the rights of the ordinary person? But, to borrow a phrase from one of Lincoln’s successors, this is fake news.

Modern democracy has a few cardinal elements, among them equality, representative government, the rule of law, majority governance.

Just a few moments’ consideration should be enough to realize that representative government is not synonymous with government of or by the people. Rather, the representative replaces the people, is a substitute, establishes a distance between the people and government. First they take your vote, then your place. The magic of democracy lies in its ability to persuade you otherwise, that you and the representative are one, not two.

On the rule of law, the doctrine that holds all citizens equal before the law: have we forgotten to ask who makes the law? The people or dominant social groups? The latter’s representatives, of course, who also enforce it. Thus, to cite a recent instance from the United States, Barack Obama freely confessed to the U.S. having “tortured some folks” after 9/11, but refused to prosecute the persecutors. If the powerful get absolved, does the rule of law prevail? Have you asked yourself why, exactly, the myriad legal proceedings against the Rajapaksas – including murder and corruption – drag on interminably? Power looks after itself. These are not anomalies but a feature that traverses the system.

So, to rewrite Lincoln: democracy is government of some of the people, by a few of the people, for the most powerful segments of those people. Not something worth getting agitated over, is it?

From a minority perspective, the most insidious aspect of democracy is majority rule. It keeps the minority permanently unable to pass legislation. Thus democracy subverts its promise (equality) by being itself (majority rule). All the legislation cited here was passed by Parliament. Democratically.

No human population could be considered equal if a part of it is deemed major and the rest, minor (as Muhammad Ali Jinnah, not a politician I particularly admire, told Jawaharlal Nehru). A part significant and the rest, insignificant. A part that matters and another that does not. The Sri Lankan minorities (I despise the term, btw) have not mattered since 1948. Thus it doesn’t make much of a difference to me that yet another Sinhalese head of government has violated the constitution. The situation of the minorities remains unchanged.

S. W. R. D. Bandaranaiake, Dudley Senanayake and J. R. Jayawardene signed agreements to institute Tamil rights/equality. Then disregarded their own commitments. Chandrika Kumaratunga and Sirisena/Wickremasinghe promised rights/equality. Then negated their own promises. Would a minority be wrong to identify a pattern here?

From a minority perspective, democracy is a political system that structurally enables its oppression by the majority, but allows that same majority to stage its practices as the will of the people, all the people, therefore a good thing. Rather than the best possible, conceivable form of government, democracy is a form of domination, of the minority by the majority.

Opinion of President: must not be opinion of the wild ass

The President had every opportunity to test this out via provisions in the Constitution. But he did not take recourse to such reasonable steps

by Tassie Seneviratne-Nov 4, 2018

( November 4, 2018, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) On October 26, 2018, in a surprise move, President Maithripala Sirisena sacked incumbent Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and appointed Mr.Mahinda Rajapaksa, MP, as Prime Minister.

This sudden move has caused turmoil in the country and created a Constitutional crisis.

The President has based his action purportedly under Article 42 (4) of the Constitution which reads: “If in his opinion any other MP is most likely to command the majority of Parliament.” (emphasis is mine)

The word opinion in legal terms is defined as: formal statement of reasons for judgment.

Reasons, is the operative word here. Although action under this Article appears to be a new phenomenon, not thrashed out in the Supreme Court, the word reason/reasonable, is well established in our laws.

The test as to whether an action is reasonable or not is: Whether, given the same facts, any person with average intelligence will come to the same conclusion. So, it is not just the opinion of the wild ass that matters, but the opinion of a person with average intelligence.

In the context of the fact that Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe recently defeated a ‘No Confidence’ motion against him in Parliament with a large majority, should have been a factor to take into consideration when judging who is likely to command a majority in Parliament.

Moreover, the President had every opportunity to test this out via provisions in the Constitution. But he did not take recourse to such reasonable steps.

I am not challenging the other reasons the President has enumerated to tell the people that Mr. Ranil Wickremesinghe is not suitable to be Prime Minister. What matters here is the Article under which he is purported to have acted. It is clear that in addition to removing the Prime Minister unconstitutionally, the President has taken mean opportunity to sling mud at him with matters extraneous to Article 42 (4) of the Constitution under which he is purported to have acted

The action of the President, if not led by the opinion of the wild ass, smacks of intrigue.

(The writer is a Retd. Senior Superintendent of Police;Human Rights activist.)

Sirisena’s second turnaround

triggered a new phase in Western meddling?

 2018-11-05

Maithripala Sirisena is not exactly a type of politician described as ‘charismatic’ or ‘revolutionary.’ But in the space of three and a half years he has pulled off two dramatic political reversals in the country’s electoral history. The first was in 2014 when he broke ranks with the ruling UPFA coalition to be the UNP-led Opposition’s common candidate in the 2015 election. Now he’s unceremoniously dumped his UNP coalition partner, pulling the UPFA along with him to appoint his one-time bete noireMahinda Rajapaksa as his Prime Minister. 

With the UPFA having to prove a majority in the House in the days ahead in order to crystallise the move, the situation has parallels with that which prevailed when the UNP-led coalition that failed to garner a clear majority in 2015, and multiple cross-overs helped to consolidate power. 

"UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres in a phone call with President Sirisena on Nov.1 echoed the call of the western powers, urging the president to “revert to Parliamentary procedures and allow the Parliament to vote as soon as possible"

There has been furious debate on the legality/constitutionality or otherwise of the president’s actions, by loyalists on either side. This discussion related to the 19th Amendment that redefined the presidential powers. The main point of contention is that the Sinhala version of the Constitution is said to include ‘removal’ by the president as one of the circumstances in which the prime minister ceases to hold office, whereas this condition is missing in the English version. It is the Sinhala version that prevails when there is a dispute, according to lawyers. A Supreme Court determination, if sought, would no doubt, help settle the legal question. 
Meanwhile a closer look at the social context might help understand the forces at work in this drama. While constitutional experts split hairs over the interpretation of Article 48 subsection (1), or the meaning of Article 46 subsection (2), the reality is that these events come at a time of deep discontent among ordinary people across the country. The mood was best summed up by the chief prelate of a Colombo temple. In rough translation what he said was “Voters, when these things happened, did not cry, lament, light lamps, or curse. There was not a sound.” Ven. Galaboda Gnanissara Thera told reporters: “The people were hard-pressed, trampled upon, saddened and living in fear. In any other country if a government elected by a majority was toppled, people would rise up. But here nobody lost any sleep. I too slept well.” 

As the monk suggested, it has been business as usual for the most part - in fact, stocks hit a six-week high. The mainstream media has not gone into overdrive, and service chiefs called on the new PM within days of his appointment. 
Interestingly, those who rushed to Ranil Wickremesinghe’s side were western diplomats, who went into a huddle with him at Temple Trees and then came out with almost identical statements calling on the President to ‘reconvene parliament immediately.’ This call reflected the demand of the UNP camp, for the government to prove its majority on the floor of the House immediately, without waiting for the assigned date; Nov.16. It is the President’s prerogative to prorogue parliament, and the inordinate ‘concern’ expressed by these ambassadors and high commissioners in what is essentially an internal problem, could be seen as unwarranted meddling.   
“The meeting as well as subsequent declarations can be construed as a concerted and deliberate act against the Head of State, openly challenging the authority vested in the President by the people, interfering in internal political processes, and violating Sri Lanka’s sovereignty,” said Tamara Kunanayakam, Sri Lanka’s former Ambassador to the UN, addressing an ‘Eliya’ briefing. 

She drew attention to the hypocrisy of these statements made by those who had nothing to say when Wickremesinghe was made prime minister in 2015 with the UNP in a minority while the UPFA held a two thirds majority in parliament, and when local and provincial council elections were endlessly postponed. 
“How do you explain that the same indignation was missing when Germany was unable to form a government for five months, when Belgium had no government for almost two years (541 days) and Northern Ireland was without government for even longer?” she asked.
In a more respectful response, the Chinese ambassador called on both MR and RW, while a spokesman in Beijing said “What is going on in Sri Lanka is their domestic affairs.” It should be mentioned that when Wickremesinghe was asked in an interview with NDTV if he saw a ‘Chinese hand’ behind what was going on, his categorically reply was “I don’t see a Chinese hand.” 

In a development that could raise some eyebrows, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres in a phone call with President Sirisena on Nov.1 echoed the call of the western powers, urging the president to “revert to Parliamentary procedures and allow the Parliament to vote as soon as possible,” according to a readout of the conversation on the UN website. “He encouraged the Government to uphold its earlier commitments to human rights, justice and reconciliation, in line with UNHRC resolutions,” the statement dated Nov.2, said. In a previous statement of  Oct.28, however, the UNSG had only said he was ‘following the latest developments with great concern’ and calling on the government to respect democratic values and constitutional process, uphold rule of law and ensure the safety of all Sri Lankans. 
The reference to UNHRC resolutions raises the question as to whether the UNSG’s ‘second thoughts’ on the matter were influenced by those same western powers that led the 2015 GenevaResolution against Sri Lanka.  The other question is whether the western powers ‘concerns’ for Sri Lanka have more to do with their own vested interests, than peace and stability in the island nation. 

"In a more respectful response, the Chinese ambassador called on both MR and RW, while a spokesman in Beijing said “What is going on in Sri Lanka is their domestic affairs.” 

The UNSG’s revised remarks come on the heels of a visit to the Speaker of Parliament on Oct. 30 by a delegation of Ambassadors and High Commissioners from the EU,Canada, UK and Germany along with the UN Resident Representative. At this meeting they reportedly warned of ‘inimical consequences’ of the power transition. It’s relevant to recall here how, during the 2014 CIA-backed coup in Ukraine, the US roped in a UN representative to help legitimize its actions. Or in other words ‘glue the thing together’ as a US official famously said in a leaked phone call with the US ambassador in Ukraine at the time. 
The sequence of events in Sri Lanka would suggest western powers have gone into high-gear over the current political impasse, presumably with a view to influencing the outcome. These developments serve as a pointer to intense underlying geopolitical tensions in the region. Western powers alarmed at a rising China’s expanding footprint in this small but strategically located state, had counted on RW to bring the country within the western sphere of influence. The prospect of that project being undermined has rung alarm bells. 

The new government will have more to deal with than revelations of an assassination plot targeting the President and former Defence Secretary. It will also have to navigate the threat of possible interventions by western powers alarmed by the prospect of further inroads by China. Such interventions will no doubt come packaged in the guise of a ‘concern for democracy and human rights.’

Flawed debate; sidetracked issues

By G. H. Peiris-November 4, 2018, 12:00 pm 

It is with a sense of gratitude that I read the ‘Opinion’ titled ‘A Flawed Argument’ by Savitri Goonesekere in last Friday’s issue of The Island, in which she has explained that it is not the discrepancy between the Sinhala and the English versions of the 19th Amendment, but the principle – "the Golden Rule" – of relevance to an adjudication of President Sirisena’s removal of Ranil Wickremesinghe from the premiership is that "Constitutional Provisions must be given a meaning that is purposive to fulfill the objective and intention" of the related provisions. When a legal luminary of the stature of Professor Goonesekere imparts her wisdom and knowledge no sensible layman would dare dispute her. Yet it would not be insensible for a layman like me to request several vitally important further clarifications on her interpretation.

First of all, is it not essential to take into consideration the qualifications pertaining to the near unanimity that prevailed in our parliament over the need to curtail presidential powers at the time the 19th Amendment was enacted. In that context, Professor Goonesekere, shouldn’t we look carefully at the general stipulations of the constitution (copied below) on how the "sovereignty of the people" should find expression in the legislative, executive and judicial power configurations of government? Or, is this concept of ‘sovereignty of the people’ a whole lot of rubbish?

Constitution of Sri Lanka - Chapter 1 - Exercise of Sovereignty

The Sovereignty of the people shall be exercised and enjoyed in the following manner—

(a)  the legislative power of the people shall be exercised by Parliament, consisting of elected representatives of the people and by the people at a referendum.

(b)  the executive power of the people, including the defence of Sri Lanka, shall be exercised by the President of the Republic elected by the people.

(c)  the judicial power of the people shall be exercised by Parliament through courts, tribunals and institutions created and established or recognised by the Constitution or created and established by law, except in regard to matters relating to the privileges, immunities and powers of Parliament and of its Members wherein the judicial power of the people may be exercised directly by Parliament according to law.

Likewise, among the new constitutional provisions brought into being by the ‘19th A’, there were several others that did not relate to presidential powers vis-à-vis the Prime Minister and the Parliament. For instance, there were those that elevated the concept of ‘National Government’ to constitutional status, those pertaining to presidential powers over Provincial Councils, and those providing for the establishment of a Constitutional Council and nine "independent" Commissions. In deciding on the ‘objective and intention’ of the legislators lending their support to the clause of the bill in professorial dispute between Goonesekera and her former Law Faculty colleague G. L. Peiris, is it not relevant to take into account the possibility of impulses other than those pertaining to the powers exercised by the President last week that swayed them to support the amendment?

Among the other impulses I refer to, there were, for instance, the introduction of the concept of ‘National Government’ and the expansion of the size of the cabinet and the number of ministerial posts which that entailed. Thus, does Professor Goonesekera imply that the related considerations are of no relevance now to determining the ‘objective and intention’ of the members of parliament? If the good lady does, it would be quite incredible.

The discrepancy between the Sinhala and English versions of a single provision of the ‘19th A’ which Professor Goonesekera considers as being of little relevance to a probe into the ‘objective and intention’ of the ‘19th A’ comes closely in the heels of other more general submissions made in an article co-authored by her on behalf of the illustrious ‘Friday Forum’ (which The Island carried), the thematic thrust of which was that President Sirisena is guilty of gross violations of the Constitution. In that context I find it necessary to argue that the near-exclusive focus on constitutional issues in the ongoing public discussions, regardless of the unassailable eminence of the ‘Man Fridays’ on whose behalf she had written that piece, is it itself thoroughly flawed.

The crux of my submission here is that the disclosures made by President Sirisena in the course of his ‘Address to the Nation’ on the evening of 28 October are of far greater relevance to the debate on propriety of the reforms he implemented than constitutional issues. Admittedly, the president’s charges such as the likely complicity of his former prime minister in the gigantic "Robbery of the Central Bank" caused no surprise in that they were no more than confirmations of widely prevalent suspicions based on the well known relations that prevailed among the main participants in that heist, and on media reports on proceedings of the ‘Bond Commission’. Several other indictments such as Ranil Wickreme-singhe’s autocratic disregard of the president’s constitutional authority (as he did even in his earlier spell as prime minister from December 2000 to April 2004), and his violation of the tenets of cabinet government were also widely known as features of his personal style of leadership and management. Nor is there a surprise in his pathetic dependence on the support of his guardians among the global powers to recover the lost position as the country’s ‘strongman’, and in the blatant duplicity seen in the response of the NATO powers to his appeal. But there were two other presidential indictments of far greater significance which were well within the realm of criminality and moral turpitude that have remained sidetracked.

Elaborating on one such accusation (as recorded in the English translation of President Sirisena’s address published in The Island of 29th October) the president stated:

"I must tell you that the committee set up by Mr. Ranil Wickremesinghe to manage the economy was totally fraudulent. The decisions taken by that committee were fraudulent. It was a major challenge to abolish it. As an alternative to that committee, I have established the National Economic Council. Mr. Ranil Wickremesinghe has taken (sic.) everything possible to weaken that Commission (sic.) The monthly emoluments for the economic expert was paid by an international monetary institution respected by all of us. On Mr. Wickremesinghe’s advice, that payment was stopped. Mr. Wickremesinghe took steps to prevent the Commission from functioning"…

The other, which ought to be considered more damning than all else, constituted a part of the President’s reference to the alleged conspiracy to assassinate him. The relevant extracts from the published translation read as follows:

"The reports provided by the CID and other investigating authorities including the Intelligence Bureau showed that this is a very serious matter. In this plot, there is a wide range of information which has not been disclosed to the public. There is also a Cabinet Minister in this plot to assassinate me. Furthermore, there have been tremendous pressures on investigations. There were instances of some responsible officers of the Attorney General’s Department evading the investigation duties."

The ‘Address to the Nation’ was not read from a script. The president, as usual, was employing his extraordinary communication skills in flawless Sinhala. Yet, since there were public announcements about the impending ‘Address’ throughout that day, listeners were entitled to assume that it was well prepared and carefully designed, quite unlike the extempore pronouncements which some of our garrulous politicians make from public platforms and the floor of the ‘House’. It must also be recalled that the indictment was made after protracted investigations including prolonged interrogation and the incarceration of a Deputy Inspector General of Police.

Many in the President’s audience are also aware of the enormity of the losses our nation has suffered since the late 1950s as a result of assassinations targeted at national leaders. It has also been widely observed that such losses have not been confined to scarce leadership talent, but have invariably resulted in the emergence of mediocrity at the apex of the political system and at various levels of its sub-national hierarchy.

Another fact which perhaps is somewhat less well known is the probable involvement of some of the major world powers in assassinations and mass exterminations that have occurred in other countries of South Asia and elsewhere – also since the late 1950s. Patrice Lumumba, Salvador Allende and Zulfifer Ali Bhuto rank among the more prominent victims of the Cold War era. In the more recent past there were other contributions of the West to safeguarding democracy such as setting in motion the chaos in Libya (and the murder of Muamma Gaddafi),

Iraq (and the annihilation of an estimated 700,000 Iraqis including Saddam Hussain), and the reduction of the unique city of Damascus to rubble rank among its other major contributions to safeguarding democracy. In Nepal the officially published version of King Birendra’s assassination being attributed to Prince Dipendra (his son and heir to the throne) is considered by some as the cover-up of an externally engineered plot. These are only a few examples known to us of ‘regime changes’ operations conducted in the past few decades.

What the foregoing considerations point at is that people urgently need the President to elaborate and substantiate his indictments and the former Prime Minister to answer them without confining himself to stating mama eva prathikshepa karanava (I reject them). The latter, in particular, is absolutely vital because his image has been severely tarnished.

That the popular support he had at the time his party secured about 106 parliamentary seats has been severely eroded was made plainly evident by the results of the nation-wide local government polls of February 2018. There is also no secret about the fact that the delays in conducting elections to Provincial Councils is due mainly to his fear of facing the electorate. The parliament remaining prorogued until 16th November gives both of them – President and the ex-PM – adequate time to elaborate their case.

Hastily delivered ‘midnight goodies’ will derail budget, despite assurances by Finance Ministry

The relief package goes against what is known as ‘disciplining the budget’, a must for Sri Lanka to maintain balance in the economy and slow down the accumulation of debt

 Monday, 5 November 2018

Midnight goodies package

According to a press release by Ministry of Finance (available at: http://www.treasury.gov.lk/article/-/article-viewer-portlet/render/view/program-for-economic-revival), a number of fiscal measures to relieve the public have been introduced on the direction of the new Minister of Finance. It is not clear whether these measures have been introduced after careful analysis of their impact on the budget, economy, and taxpayers. The Ministry feels that there is a setback to the economy due to slower economic growth and rising cost of living. The former is an accurate observation, since growth has continued to fall since 2013 and the most optimistic prediction for the next 4-year period has been between 4-4.5%. However, the latter contention is not accurate, since the nation-wide inflation, as measured by the National Consumer Price Index calculated by the Department of Census and Statistics, has been continuously falling in the last few months. It stood at 0.9% at end-September, a rate pretty much close to zero.


Danger of adopting pro-cyclical measures

The Ministry has noted that the next few months will be a superb period for Sri Lanka. There will be a good agricultural output in the coming Maha Season, and higher hydro power generation thanks to the generous rains the weather gods have offered to the country. It implies that the economy will be on the upward cycle in the next year. Hence, the new relief package amounts to riding on the rising economic cycle, which economists call ‘pro-cyclical measures’. But no matter how much temptation there is to do so, there is a danger of embracing pro-cyclical measures. That is because the growing economy will increase incomes, boosting the demand of the people. With the relief package introduced by the Finance Ministry, that demand is further reinforced, putting pressure on prices to increase and, as a consequence of that, exchange rate to depreciate. These are two outcomes which any government does not wish to have. Hence, to mitigate the adverse long-term effects of this undesired outcome, the Central Bank will have to take ‘counter-cyclical monetary policy measures’, in the form of increasing interest rates and cutting down credit growth. This would bring the Central Bank in direct conflict with the Ministry of Finance.


Countering the goal of disciplining the budget 

The relief package has 15 components. Of them, 12 are fiscal measures, 1 quasi-fiscal measure and 2 non-fiscal measures. Fiscal measures are directly related to the budget, quasi-fiscal measures, indirectly related, and non-fiscal measures not related. These are given in the Table. From a budgetary point, 10 measures are revenue-sacrificing measures, while three are expenditure-enhancement measures. Since they both lead to widen the budget deficit by increasing expenditure and reducing revenue, they are not neutral to the budget. In fact, they go against what is known as ‘disciplining the budget’, a must for Sri Lanka to maintain balance in the economy, and slow down the accumulation of debt by the Government.


Central Bank’s advice to discipline the budget by increasing revenue

Both the Central Bank Annual Report for 2016, and the Annual Report of the Ministry of Finance for 2017, have emphasised the need for ‘disciplining the budget’, which they have called ‘budgetary consolidation’ through effective revenue enhancement. Increasing revenue has been emphasised because Government expenditure programs, as they stand today, are not amenable to pruning. In a Box article in the Central Bank Annual Report for 2016 (Box 09 on pages 201-4), the Bank has informed Parliament, and through Parliament, the public, that what the Government should do is to work for attaining a sustainable debt level through the consolidation of the budget by enhancing revenue.


All governments should have a commitment to discipline the budget 

That is because the present debt level is unsustainable on a number of counts. Since the Government revenue has not increased at the same rate as the growth in the economy, the revenue has been insufficient to pay interest, and repay the principal of the maturing loans. Consequently, all successive Governments have been forced to borrow more to meet the debt repayment obligations. This is known as ‘rolling-over of public debt’. It has not only put the budget in a precarious situation, but also contributed to unsustainable growth in the level of public debt. As a result, all Governments in the past have been caught in this trap. The way out was to increase the level of Government revenue as a percentage of the total size of the economy, known as the Gross Domestic Product or GDP.


Sri Lanka’s revenue to GDP is exactly half the average for Asia 

The Central Bank, in arguing out its case, had given numbers relating to some selected countries in Asia for 2015. Sri Lanka’s government revenue to GDP ratio amounted to 13.3%. whereas the average for Asia had been double that ratio at 26.6%. Hence, there was a long way for Sri Lanka to go in order to prevent a total fiscal explosion. and through it, an implosion of the economy. Hence, the Central Bank had warned the Government that ‘it is crucial to continue with the necessary fiscal reforms with disciplined and determined political commitment, without deviating from the fiscal consolidation path, in order to achieve the envisaged fiscal targets in the medium to long run’ (p 204). This is a warning not only to the previous Government, but also to the new Government that has been formed.


Rare instance of both Central Bank and Ministry of Finance speaking the same language

Agreeing with the Central Bank’s recommendation, the Ministry of Finance in its Annual Report for 2017, again submitted to Parliament, and through it to the public, has outlined the medium-term fiscal strategy of the government. In more general terms, it has elaborated this strategy as follows: ‘Within the context of the broader framework of Government’s fiscal strategy, the medium-term fiscal framework is formulated with a view to furthering fiscal consolidation efforts, through a sustainable reduction of the fiscal deficit and public debt, while enhancing revenue mobilisation. In order to facilitate the Government’s fiscal strategy, various reform initiatives were undertaken in such areas as taxation policy and administration, expenditure management, Government debt management, reforms in state owned enterprises, public finance and procurement management, among others’ (p 8).


Finance Ministries love budget profligacy

This is a rare occasion where the Central Bank and the Ministry of Finance have been speaking the same language. Normally, what has happened in the past has been that when the Bank has been promoting budgetary discipline, the Ministry has been engaged in budgetary profligacy. This has been an eternal battle between Central Banks and Finance Ministries. Cash-strapped governments, without considering the long term adverse consequences, have been forcing Central Banks to give them cheap money on the one hand, and approving of their profligate policies on the other.


India’s RBI under attack

The latest episode has come from neighbouring India where Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, angered by the independent standing of the Reserve Bank of India, is reported to have said that ‘the nation India is higher than any institution’, meaning that RBI should be subservient to political authorities in the country (available at: https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2018/11/03/indias-central-bank-faces-a-major-test-of-its-independence). This is the usual slogan used by politicians who are bent on exploiting the money printing powers of Central Banks for their political objectives.

In this background, the policy convergence between the Central Bank and the Ministry of Finance with regard to a common fiscal strategy was a welcome development. However, this development is going to be torn apart by the new goodies package announced by the Ministry of Finance.


Offering goodies to people without resources

Governments have a right to offer relief packages to people. However, to offer them, they should have acquired capacity to do so, without disturbing the prevailing macroeconomic atmosphere of the country. The present situation in Sri Lanka is least-qualified to undertake such a daring enterprise by the Government. If it does so simply for winning the acceptance of the gullible public, in the subsequent periods, it has to reap the unfavourable consequences that would follow. In Sri Lanka’s case, throughout the post-independence history, this has been the popular method used by politicians of both sides to win elections, which they carried out without looking at the ability of the country to sustain those populist measures. Except in 1954 and 1955, when the country’s finances were managed by a Minister of Finance trained in the London School of Economics, M D H Jayawardena, in all the other years it was a deficit budget that had been put in place.


Domestic income increases end up in other countries via imports 

The objective has been to promote economic growth through increased public expenditure programs. But, the examination of the post-independence history reveals that that is the only thing which has not been attained by Sri Lanka. Though budget deficits have been high, at around 7% of GDP on average, economic growth has been low at 4.4% on average. This is understandable because in a small open economy, dependent on international trade, whatever the income created by profligate fiscal policies is to be leaked out of the country through increased import of goods and services. When this is funded through external borrowings, another dimension in the form of interest payment and repayment of the principal will be added to this list, making it difficult for the country to maintain the exchange rate at a stable level. Thus, the Sri Lankan rupee, which was exchanged at 3.36 rupees per US dollar at the time of independence, lost its value continuously, reaching a level of Rs 177 per dollar at the last record. This value can be maintained only by releasing valuable foreign reserves built by the Central Bank by borrowing from abroad.


Using exchange rate as a ball game 

The press release issued by the Ministry of Finance announcing the goodies package has expected to improve the position of the households by giving ‘additional income to their hands’. It is true that a certain group of people will get additional income into their hands. However, that will become the root cause of a series of economic ailments, as I have argued in my previous article in this series (http://www.ft.lk/columns/With-this-man-made-Constitutional-crisis--economy-will-be-the--casualty--resolve-it-quickly-or-peris/4-665587).

This is what I said in that article: ‘Thus, the exchange rate has been the most popular ‘ball game’ played by all political parties. When they are in the Opposition, they blame the Government in power for allowing the rupee to fall, implying that it is due to their bad economic management. But when they are in the Government, they justify its fall tooth and nail. Yet, like the caravan that moves while the dogs are barking, the rupee too continues to fall in value month after month, because no proper remedial measures are taken by governments driven by a populace that wants to import more and produce less.

‘Any money given to them through liberal Government spending is immediately spent on imports, rather than on investment. Recently, I asked MBA students of a state university what they would do if they are given Rs. 10 million each. The answer was unanimous that they would buy a car or travel abroad or spend that money to buy various electronic equipment that have become the fashion of the day. With that type of mentality, the increased income through expanded Government expenditure programs, financed of course by borrowing or printing new money, would end up as incomes of people in other countries. Thus, the pressure for the rupee to fall in the value in the market is unavoidable.’



Goodies packages

Hence, the goodies package has been announced by the Ministry of Finance too hastily. It appears that it has been made without proper analysis of its short- to medium-term impact on the economy. The inevitable result is that it would lead to further depreciation of the rupee. The same pressure was exerted on the value of the rupee when the UNP Government decided, unilaterally, to increase the salaries of Government servants by Rs 10,000, without capability for the Government to sustain the same, and reduce the fuel prices after it was clear that the reduction of global prices was short-term and would reverse in the near future. The result was for the rupee to come under pressure severely, causing it to fall in value in the market. This is therefore a repeat exercise of what had happened in early 2015.

As I mentioned at the beginning of the article, the Central Bank will have to take action, belatedly, to rectify the error by way of increasing interest rates and curtailing credit growth. That would be counterproductive to economic growth objectives.
(W A Wijewardena, a former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka, can be reached at waw1949@gmail.com)

Defense secretary of MARA-SIRA junta is a drug dealer! Evidence with photos-Will commanders abide by his orders ?

(Lanka e News -03.Nov.2018, 5.00PM) Believe it or not , the MARA –SIRA unconstitutional junta has appointed Hemasiri Fernando a notorious earner of illicit income who had close dealings with the most leading heroin magnates as their new defense secretary.

Hemasiri has lastday issued an illegal order to the commanders of the three forces to clear the Temple Trees. The commanders should think not twice but thrice before taking action on an illegal order given by a drug baron

It was infamous Hemasiri Fernando misusing his powers of the Olympics who smuggled in a quantity of heroin of the drug magnate Wele Sudha , and the one who gave protection to it was DIG Pathirane . After the conclusion of the deal , the troika – Hemasiri ,Wele Sudha and Pathirane did a pilgrimage to Kataragama to redeem the vow they had kept to successfully conclude the operation they masterminded. The photograph herein reveals all.

Lanka e news always first with the news and best with views when espousing and exposing the truth come what may , published this photograph first time in November 2016 . The good governance government did no investigation into this .

During the tenure of office of ex president Chandrika Bandaranaike too in 2005 when DIG T.A. Anandaraja attended the Birthday bash of the daughter of drug dealer Augustus Jesudasan ( brother in law of another drug tycoon Mohomed Shyam ) the Divaina newspaper published the photograph which led to Anandaraja to lose his job. On that same day a photograph depicting another infamous drug dealer Wele Sudha with Hemasiri too , but he managed to continue in his post somehow without any hindrance .

In the end , today it is this drug dealer who has become not only the chief of staff but also the new defense secretary .Instead of incurring the wrath he is receiving the blessings of MARA –SIRA junta . Whither Sri Lanka !

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by     (2018-11-03 11:29:42)

Victory for San Francisco State professor over pro-Israel lawfare suit

Professor Rabab Abdulhadi (second from right, in front) stands with student supporters at San Francisco State University. (SFSU GUPS)

Nora Barrows-Friedman - 1 November 2018

After three attempts at litigation, pro-Israel lawfare strategists have failed to silence a Palestinian American professor at San Francisco State University.

On Monday, a federal judge in San Francisco finally dismissed a frivolous lawsuit against professor Rabab Abdulhadi and the university over her Palestine research and criticisms of Israel, which was filed as part of a years-long targeted bullying campaign intended to censor and threaten professors and students who advocate for Palestinian rights.

Judge William Orrick III “this time dismissed the case with prejudice, meaning the lawsuit cannot be filed again,” said Palestine Legal on Tuesday.

The lawsuit, which was initially filed in June 2017 by the Lawfare Project – and then re-filed twice more after each attempt was dismissed – accused Abdulhadi and her employer of fostering a hostile environment for Jewish students which they claimed was due to the growing support for Palestinian rights on campus.

The Lawfare Project is a group that has described itself as “the legal arm of the pro-Israel community.”

The plaintiffs accused San Francisco State University of violating Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, using a legal strategy that claims that universities fail to protect Jewish students by not cracking down on Palestine solidarity activism.

That strategy was pioneered by Kenneth Marcus, a far-right Israel advocate who was confirmed earlier this year as the director of the Office for Civil Rights at the US Department of Education.

This means he is now in charge of investigating alleged violations of the civil rights law.

However, in his decision on Monday, Orrick noted that the plaintiffs “have had ample opportunities to attempt to state their Title VI claims but have not been able to do so.”

The judge indicated in August that he was inclined to dismiss the suit during a final court hearing, but had not delivered his decision until this week.

“It’s a significant defeat for both lawfare as a legal bullying strategy and the Lawfare Project as an organization,” Palestine Legal’s Liz Jackson told The Electronic Intifada on Wednesday.

The Lawfare Project “had three different legal complaints and a team of corporate lawyers but they had no facts indicating there was discrimination,” Jackson added.

Rabab Abdulhadi@AbdulhadiRabab

Justice prevails! Zionist Lawfare frivolous lawsuit intended to silence scholarship, pedagogical and advocacy on justice in/for Palestine has been defeated.Judge dismisses with prejudices!

11:33 PM - Oct 29, 2018

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“This is a victory for academic freedom and for the right to teach, research and advocate for justice in/for Palestine, as part of justice for all. Our movement is vindicated today,” Abdulhadi wrote on Facebook.

“We made it crystal clear that our commitment to justice in/for Palestine is unambiguously opposed to all forms of racism and racial discrimination including white supremacy and xenophobia, anti-Arab racism, anti-Blackness and anti-Semitism,” she added.

“Unfounded and malicious”

The suit was initially dismissed by Orrick in November 2017, but he allowed the plaintiffs to amend and resubmit their case.

The Lawfare Project refiled a version of the suit, but the federal court again threw out all of the claims in March, noting that the complaint was “far too long, repetitive and full of barely relevant material.”

Undeterred, the Lawfare Project refiled the suit once more. But it is now permanently closed and the organization cannot refile again.

“The unfounded and malicious nature of this bogus suit against Dr. Abdulhadi is now clear for all to see,” explained Mark Kleiman, Abdulhadi’s attorney.

“This has disrupted nearly two years of her life and her work for justice in Palestine, which is the purpose of ‘lawfare,’” he noted.

The lesson students and scholars can learn from this legal victory, Jackson said, “is that Israel’s defenders may harass you with frivolous litigation, but they will not succeed in silencing you because the facts are that advocacy for justice and equality is protected.”

“Avowed mission”

The Lawfare Project has “an avowed mission of inflicting massive punishments against critics of Israel and sought to block research and speech supporting Palestinian rights” at San Francisco State, Palestine Legal has stated.

In 2016, The Lawfare Project’s director, Brooke Goldstein, was filmed asking Israel lobby leaders in New York, “Why are we using the word Palestinian?”

“There’s no such thing as a Palestinian person,” Goldstein asserted.

The initial 73-page complaint listed about a dozen incidents, some dating back to the early 1990s – before many of the university’s current students would have been born – in an attempt to paint a picture of systematic discrimination.

The complaint invoked the so-called US State Department definition of anti-Semitism, which conflates criticism of Israel and its Zionist state ideology with anti-Jewish bigotry.

A principal incident in the complaint concerns a “Know your rights” fair in February 2017. Muslim, Arab and Latino campus groups organized the event in response to US President Donald Trump’s slate of executive orders targeting immigrants, refugees and Muslims.

Hillel, an on-campus Israel advocacy organization, claimed Palestine solidarity groups discriminated against Jewish groups by not inviting them to participate. After a lengthy investigation, San Francisco State University cleared the fair’s organizers of religious discrimination, but found them responsible for retaliation and viewpoint discrimination.

The lawsuit also alleged that students who disrupted a 2016 event featuring Nir Barkat, the far-right Israeli mayor of Jerusalem, made “antagonizing and threatening” remarks leading to an atmosphere of “fear and intimidation faced by Jewish students on campus” after the event.

Students representing an array of communities on campus protested Barkat because of his record of rampant Palestinian home demolitions, collective punishments and support of Israeli settler groups.

Hillel, which hosted the Barkat event, “broadcast false allegations that protesters were anti-Semitic and physically threatening towards Jewish students,” according to Palestine Legal.

Those accusations resulted in “widespread smearing and cyberbullying” of student protesters, “including death and rape threats,” the civil rights group said.

An independent legal investigation determined that Hillel’s allegations were unfounded.

Exploiting the Pittsburgh massacre

Meanwhile, in the wake of the massacre of 11 Jewish worshippers at a synagogue in Pittsburgh last weekend, activists and civil rights protectors are worried that Israel advocates may exploit the murders to push harder for a pending federal bill that seeks to blame supporters of Palestinian rights, especially campus campaigners of the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement, for anti-Semitism.

Lara Friedman@LaraFriedmanDC

I’m seeing tweets pushing “Anti-Semitism Awareness Act” (S2940/HR5924) as a response to the Pittsburgh massacre.

Given the title, some may naturally assume these bills deal w/ sharp rise in anti-Semitism linked to Nazis, white supremacists & the like.

They’d be wrong.

1/

11:26 AM - Oct 29, 2018

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“In response, we all have to continue to insist – as professor Abdulhadi puts it – on the indivisibility of justice. None of us are safe or free unless all of us safe and free. The threat is not campus human rights activists, but white supremacists,” Palestine Legal’s Jackson told The Electronic Intifada.

Lawmakers must be urged to reject the federal legislation “as an unconstitutional and irrelevant response” to white nationalist violence, she added.

“The most important way to prepare for escalated government attacks on our right to criticize Israel’s apartheid policies is to continue criticizing Israeli policy.”